Please explain how JIRA Service Desk and JIRA Software interact?

Sam Hall
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
October 20, 2015

I'm trying to work out how to explain the situation with a client that currently has JIRA + Agile + Service Desk. My understanding is that it's assumed that we will migrate this instance to JIRA Software and then it's up to us to also then purchase JIRA Service Desk to fill the gap left by removing the plugin.

I have never used the Service Desk plugin before so I don't know how it works. Will the two products still interact with one another now that JIRA Service Desk is a standalone product? Or do these users need to connect to two totally different products now depending on which features they need at the time. I'm totally lost and the documentation doesn't seem to help... https://confluence.atlassian.com/migration/jira-7/cloud_jira+agile+jsd_product-changes

2 answers

1 accepted

0 votes
Answer accepted
Nic Brough -Adaptavist-
Community Leader
Community Leader
Community Leaders are connectors, ambassadors, and mentors. On the online community, they serve as thought leaders, product experts, and moderators.
October 20, 2015

Ah, it's not quite "standalone software".  JIRA Service Desk and JIRA Software are both "applications".  They both run on the framework provided by JIRA Core.  There are three downloads available to make things easier for us (JIRA Software, JIRA Service Desk and JIRA Core), but you can use any one of those three as a base for the others.

For your case, I would install JIRA Software, then you can use "manage applications" to add Service Desk to it.  You could upgrade to JIRA Service Desk and then add Software.  Or even install Core and add both.   I chose to recommend Software first simply because you say you personally haven't used Service Desk before, so stick with the more familiar and add SD later.

Your users will continue to work in one place, but I'd review your licences - you no longer have to have "Agile" numbers match "plain JIRA" - you can do things like have 500 users with access to Core, but only 250 can use Software (under JIRA 6.4 and below, you'd have to licence Agile at 500, even if only 250 use it)

Sam Hall
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
October 22, 2015

Thanks Nic, that makes perfect sense to me now. So all that's happening is the user licensing is partitionable. Actually, I think that's great. The info page about my scenario could probably use some wording that reflects this situation just above the feature table... https://confluence.atlassian.com/migration/jira-7/cloud_jira+agile+jsd_product-changes When I look at that table I immediately think, "Oh no! Where's the column with all the features!", thinking that I have no choice but to pick one option. Hey, it's kind of ironic that Atlassian put all this effort into building the market place that encourages 1:1 licensing for 3rd party plugins. Then turns around and says, "Wait a minute, that's a terrible model!", scraps that idea for the platform itself. ;)

0 votes
michael_ngangom
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
October 21, 2015

Just to add to the Nic's answer- you can always refer the JIRA 7 migration hub- https://confluence.atlassian.com/migration/jira-7 for more information.

Sam Hall
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
October 22, 2015

Yeah, that's the site everyone keeps pointing me at. The applicable link from that page is... https://confluence.atlassian.com/migration/jira-7/cloud_jira+agile+jsd_product-changes that site doesn't cover what exactly the product(s) are and how they interact with one another. E.g. this statement in the banner "...JIRA Software provides tons of great features for running software projects. Not only that, but JIRA Service Desk becomes a standalone application that's easier than ever to manage." = the root of my confusion! What am I getting now, two standalone products? wtf?? Can you put some more clarity around the situation on that page please?

Suggest an answer

Log in or Sign up to answer